Despite the global justice movement's diffuse and multifarious character, experimentation with 'new' and recovered democratic forms is an important common feature. Given the atrophied version of democracy offered by neoliberal states hemmed in by the prerogatives ofglobal capital, attempts to reinvent radically egalitarian, decentralized and participatory democratic practices are unsurprising, However, pervasive anarchist and post-modern assumptions have led to an 'anti-statism': a rejection of the possibility that state power can be used by progressive forces to create alternatives to capitalism. In this paper I engage with the theoretical roots of anti-statism and argue it is rooted in an impoverished and monolithic understanding of the state, is accompanied by a romanticized view of civil society as a realm of freedom and autonomy, and results in the adoption of easily marginalized forms of resistance. To illustrate, I examine some of the most influential contemporary sources of such ideas, namely the Social Forum movement and the post-2001 autonomist movements of Argentina. Finally, using insights from Gramscian and neo-Marxist theory, I argue that an abandonment of the state as a terrain of struggle permits its continued and unhindered use by capital, reinforces the neoliberal mantra that the state should not be used to subject the market to social values, and abandons the possibility of creating a unified, sustained and effective counter-hegemonic political project.